VIII - Justice (Reversed)
by arcanista
Summary: Undyne arrives to take the human to see Alphys. A long-delayed plan is set into motion. Preliminary data analysis. [follow-up to Volatile Memory. Please read this series on AO3 instead as I cannot guarantee the viewing experience here is going to be correct.]
1. Chapter 1

_You and I, we may look the same_  
 _But we are very far apart_  
 _There's bullet-holes where my compassion used to be_  
 _And there is violence in my heart_

* * *

During the gap between Undyne calling Papyrus and her actually showing up, the kid just shuts down. Sans spends a couple minutes watching Papyrus try to play with them, before he heads up to his room. He should have his papers ready and with him, that's all. Gonna need them. And a nap.

Both of those things are even true. He opens the door a crack before he goes to nap so he can make sure he doesn't sleep through Undyne showing up. Fat chance of that, as lightly as he sleeps, but better safe than sorry.

He only gets about an hour, but that's not awful for him. Through the door he can hear Papyrus talking about the history of the spiked pit. Can't hear the kid's responses, if any, but that's not exactly a surprise. Sans takes a breath and heads downstairs.

"... and then, he mandated that all spikes be fitted with protective corks! Can you believe that? Every single spike fitted with a cork! Sans! There you are! What were you doing for so long up there?"

The human looks up in his general direction, then back down at the ground. They're both sitting on the couch, at least. Took forever to get that kid to be willing to use furniture.

"Caught a nap," Sans says, and shrugs. "You guys seemed to be having a good time. And I was up early."

"Sans, it's nine-thirty!" Papyrus makes one of those noises of his. "You were only up for forty-five minutes! Is that the sort of example you want to set for the human?"

"Not sleepy," mumbles the kid, kicking their heels against the front of the couch.

"See?" says Sans, giving the kid a thumbs-up. Not that they're liable to see it. "It's all good. Undyne getting here soon, or is there time for pre-brunch?" He angles for the kitchen all the same; his idea-of-a-stomach's grumbling, and he thinks there's some sort of pizza or something in his half of the fridge. Unless the kid's suddenly gotten way less shy about snacking. Which'd be nice, but he's not getting his hopes up. Baby steps.

Ugh, this is making him sound _invested_ in all this. No more promises allowed, he promises himself. Who's even holding himself accountable to that anymore, anyway? She's dead. Dead and dust and no sign of an immediately impending reset coming to bring her back.

He opens the fridge and sticks his head in, looking for the pizza box. Undyne's not wrong, with all her murderer talk. The kid's not exactly an innocent, or at least they're insistent on taking the responsibility here. He can make all the justifications he pleases about monitoring the situation and making sure the fire doesn't start up again, but point the first, that mostly means he's just hanging out watching TV with the kid. Point the second, say that fire _does_ start up again. Pap- no.

 _God_ , he's in a bad mood today. Sans grabs a slice out of the box and a soda. He's not even being rational anymore. Undyne's not wrong, and the kid's not innocent of at least some of their wrongdoing, but they're trying. So much effort bleeds off that kid it's almost embarrassing. To him, that is.

He leans against the open fridge door, eating the slice of pizza. Kid's trying so hard that he'll see it a mile away if something goes wrong, too. Hell, Papyrus could tell, too, Sans is pretty sure.

Papyrus might even be able to whip out another miracle, if it came down to it. Just out of nowhere like that, too.

"Sans! We're not paying to freeze the house! Close the fridge!"

"Think I'm the one paying, bro," says Sans, laughing quietly. He steps back from the fridge all the same and gives it a little kick shut.

He actually manages to finish the slice of pizza, listening vaguely to Papyrus wax eloquent about deadly spikes from the other room before a loud banging sounds from the front door.

 _Here we go._ He lets Papyrus get up to take the door, and strolls over to the living room. The kid looks a bit queasy. Sans sighs, and gives them a pat on their arm. They look up, halfway jumping out of their skin, but let out a breath when they notice him. Both of them look toward the door after that.

"Undyne! Hi!" Papyrus waves at her. "You're just in time! I was just about to tell the human about the Great Spike Heist of '85! Did you wanna hear about it too? It's full of danger! And mystery! And spikes! You love spikes!"

She presses past Papyrus and looks around the living room. "Spikes _are_ pretty cool. Wait, what am I- not _now_. This is really awkward so let's just skip it. You've both been keeping watch over the human?"

"Of course!" says Papyrus. "Look, they're right there! Safe and spike-free!" He waves over at the kid. Sans lifts a hand and wiggles his fingers at Undyne. At least she left the armour at home today. Kind of a leap of faith for her, isn't it? Well, good.

The kid opens their mouth, looking up at Undyne. But their gaze slips back to the floor and they just nod.

Undyne can't look for very long at them, either. "Anyway," she says. "Ugh. Doctor Alphys wants to see the human. So I'm here to take them to her. She says she's got some stuff in the lab she can do to check out what kind of gunk's on their soul."

"Still not gonna fight," says the kid, pushing off the couch. "Whatever happens. Should just take it. Take it and save everyone."

Something blazes in Undyne's eye. "Look, you know-" she looks toward Papyrus and moves right in front of the kid, sitting on her heels, putting her face level with theirs. In a much lower voice, almost a whisper, she says, "You're a _human_ , I guess. When the king takes all seven souls and breaks the barrier, we're gonna go and _destroy humanity_. And you're-"

The kid's hands ball up into fists, and their mouth twists into an outright scowl. " _Good_ , _"_ they say.

Undyne's voice goes up half an octave and lashes at the kid like a whip. "You're okay with that?"

"You are," says the kid. They look down at their hands and lift them up just beneath their chin. Finger by finger, they unknot their own fists until their open palms are facing them. "Right?"

Undyne stands up straight. "It's not the same! For us, it's revenge! It's vengeance! It's an epic battle of good against evil!"

The kid walks right past Undyne, going to the closet. "Wanna be good," they say. "Been bad. Justice, right? Watched cartoons, too."

"Punishment isn't justice!" She marches right over to the kid, looks just about ready to pick them up by the collar, but she restrains herself at the last second. "What do you mean cartoons? I don't know what you're talking about!"

Sans scratches the corner of one socket, keeping his peace. Punishment's relation to justice or not, he's definitely less convinced that what the kid has in mind has anything to do with justice at all. Maybe, possibly, it could be just for the kid to offer up their own soul for everyone's sake, in order to see them all go free. But to do it in _retribution_ 's name... the kid's crimes aside, it wouldn't be right _now_ to march out of the underground prepared to lay waste to all opposition aboveground. And if that's even a consideration for the kid... no. Blood to pay for a mountain of dust, maybe. _Maybe_. But blood to buy that thick slurry of pain that would come? No.

The kid jams their feet into their shoes. "Whatever. Talking like a cartoon. Should be more grown-up."

"Stop fighting, everyone!" Papyrus waves his arms to catch people's attention. "Undyne! Even if you don't want to be friends with the human you should be nice! They're much less weird when you're nice! And they're a great listener! Human! You look really scary when you talk like that, so, um, please don't? We're gonna go see Doctor Alphys and she'll figure out what's wrong and everything'll be fine! So cheer up! Oh! And if we're going to Hotland, you should wear a lighter coat. It's really hot there!"

The kid looks away from the closet, hands sliding off their coat. They look up at Papyrus for a few seconds, then their shoulders slump. "Yeah," they say. "Yeah, everything fine." Something that might resemble a smile marches dutifully onto their lips.

Old hand at this that he is, Papyrus takes what he can get. He punches his fist into his other hand, and says, "Great! Let's go!"

It's weird to think of the kid's apparent proclivity for lying like a rug as a good thing. But lying requires a certain complexity of thought that Sans hadn't seen any sign of in them, a few weeks ago. Hell, thinking about it now, it even requires motivation (never much for lies, him), which needs a personality driving it.

And all of that aside, it's hard to be even put out at a white lie made for Papyrus' sake.

Not bad for a kid interdicted against names and possibly personal pronouns. At this rate Sans isn't sure those bindings can even hold up for very long, either. Of course, he's not sure the kid just brute-forcing them off is the safest idea, either. Phrases like 'catastrophic corruption' and 'erasing critical values' linger in his mind. Gonna see how bad the actual damage is soon enough, at least.

Sans gets up from the couch, joins the kid by the closet. He pulls down one of his own hoodies and shrugs into it. "Pap's right, kiddo. Probably better to be chilly for a bit than boil for the rest of the walk. Let's see what we've got here."

"You're coming, too?" Undyne rubs her forehead with her hand. "This isn't some sort of family picnic- oh, never mind. Sure! Let's have a party!"

Sans finds another hoodie for the kid, one of his again. Just what comes from being the only person in the house remotely close to the kid's height, he figures. "Here, kiddo, try this. Roll up the sleeves if we have to." He holds it open behind the kid, letting them wriggle their arms inside. "Picnic sounds good, though. Should we pack a basket, bro?" He does roll up the sleeves past the kid's wrists, tucking them in so they don't fall.

"This is a terrible time to have a picnic!" says Papyrus. "But we should definitely have one soon. I'll make the spaghetti! What are you going to bring, Undyne?"

Okay, maybe time to cool it if Papyrus's pushing that hard. "Let's talk about it on the way. You know if the riverperson's at the bank, or if we're gonna have to, ugh, walk?"

Undyne throws up her hands and sighs. "You _should_ walk more. But no, they're waiting for us. Since I guess everyone's coming."

* * *

Felt really sure going outside in just the hoodie was a bad joke, but they sail past the snow super fast. And it wasn't too cold anyway since the tall one gave them a piggy-back ride and they got to wrap up beneath his cape.

That was fun. Had to get put down to ride the boat. Not safe. Not even any rails on the boat at all, so probably fair. Only wonder a little what it would feel like to jump off and sink all the way down. And it's just wondering, they don't even worry about actually wanting to at all.

Feel way too happy about that. Or did they just not want to do it because they have a plan...? Shiver as the cave walls zip by. Don't bother listening to the grown-ups chatting.

Fish-lady's scared of them. Well, not of _them,_ or scared exactly. But they can tell she's freaked out when they talk about going to see the king. Doesn't understand why. It's what she wants, right? Wants the barrier gone, wants everyone to go free, wants to destroy all the humans.

Sounds like a good enough plan to them. Monsters seem mostly nice. Let them have grass and sun and stars and rainbows and all the things that are supposed to be good. They deserve it.

Hotland. They did read some books. Near the Core and near the city. Near the king. Gotta be a chance to get away at some point. Holds on tighter to skeleton-hands, tall in the right, short on the left. Maybe wouldn't mind if there was no chance...

Frowns. No. No, gotta fix things. Make it right. _Bad_ to not want to do that. Has to be good.

Starting to get really warm. Turns their head, looks up the long dark tunnel. Weird red glow up ahead.

"Oh boy, Hotland!" says the tall one. "I don't know anything about Hotland! I assume there's land. And it's hot. We're on a great mystery adventure!"

"Sure. Sure, whatever," says the fish-lady. "A great, wonderful mystery adventure. Almost there. A̶̷̸̲̅l̶̷̸̲̅p̶̷̸̲̅h̶̷̸̲̅y̶̷̸̲̅s̶̷̸̲̅'ll be waiting at the lab."

They push their eyebrows together, thinking. "Lab? Like... a dog?" They bite hard on their lower lip. Used to like dogs, once.

"I mean, I wouldn't rule it out," says the short one. Feel him shrug. "Probably it's more like 'laboratory'"

"Wowie, a science house!" Tall one swings their hand back and forth. "How exciting!"

Not really. "Yeah," they say. "Getting hot..." Starting to sweat under hoodie. Red glow getting closer and closer.

"Yeah, we won't be out in it for long," says the fish lady. "Normally I have to use the water cooler on the way but since we're coming by the river we'll just need to move quick- don't you _dare_ grumble, S̶̷̸̲̅a̶̷̸̲̅n̶̷̸̲̅s̶̷̸̲̅, you didn't have to come."

"Hey, just cause I'm not on fire to exercise doesn't mean that I stay in the kitchen if I can't take the heat." Short one makes a laugh, shrugs his shoulders.

"Uugh," says the tall one, but the boat pulls up to a dock before he says more.

"All life begins with Nu and ends with Nu," says the river-person as the boat stills, water splashing quietly. It's super hot here. Wants to take the hoodie off. Leaves it on.

"Okay, everybody off," says fish-lady. "Come on, go go go!" She waves everyone off the boat and onto the shore. Somehow everyone manages without running into each other. Tall skeleton picks them up from the boat and hoists them right on top of his shoulders.

They look around. So many red rocks everywhere. Is that lava over there, pouring down from somewhere? No, there's a different word if it's underground, right? Don't remember. Probably not important. Can see lab over there.

Fingers shake, thinking about doctors. Said they're going to see a doctor, right? But... doctors aren't mean. Just go see them when bad, bad, bad, bad things happen.

Well, figure this counts. Everyone starts walking behind fish-lady. They hold on, fingers curling up in cape. Try not to be nervous. Doesn't do a good job. She takes them up to the lab and they all wait while she knocks at the door. Get put down on the ground, nice and careful. Toes curl inside shoes.

"A̶̷̸̲̅l̶̷̸̲̅p̶̷̸̲̅h̶̷̸̲̅y̶̷̸̲̅s̶̷̸̲̅!" says the fish lady, hammering on the door. "I've got the human!" She looks down to glare at them, as if they're about to run away. They reach up, grab glove, grab bony hand, hold onto both of them tightly.

Door kind of jerks open. Oh, oh, it's a yellow dinosaur. In a coat. Wonders if she'll be scary. Dinosaurs like to roar and bite heads. "Um. Um, oh god, you're here already. I, uh, thought it would be a while yet."

Oh. Not scary, then.

"So, uh, that's the human?" Dinosaur looks at them. They try to poke their lips upwards, try to make a smile. "You're, um, shorter than I expected. Did you really- uh. Never mind. I've heard a lot about you?"

Doesn't answer. Just stands there, sweating into hoodie. Cold air rushing out from inside. Tries to peek around her.

"Oh! Right!" She shuffles backwards. "Come inside! So, uh, you don't like to talk a lot, do you? Some sort of trouble with that?"

Short skeleton coughs loudly behind them as they all walk inside. They shrug up at her. Lets out breath once they're inside. Nice and cold in here. Peeks around, still holding on tight to both skeletons' hands. Doesn't look much like a hospital (good). Sort of messy.

"Um, r-right. Let's go sit down. Are you... this _is_ the right human, aren't they? They don't look very, very m-murderous to me." The dinosaur leads them over to a nook. Something between a living room and a waiting room. Couches and a TV and everything. "Let's, uh, sit down I guess."

"Sorry about all these extra people," says fish-lady. "I wasn't really expecting _everyone_ to come along for the ride. This is P̶̷̸̲̅a̶̷̸̲̅p̶̷̸̲̅y̶̷̸̲̅r̶̷̸̲̅u̶̷̸̲̅s̶̷̸̲̅, I've told you all about him. And this is his brother S̶̷̸̲̅a̶̷̸̲̅n̶̷̸̲̅s̶̷̸̲̅ . I'm sure I've mentioned him once or twice." She glares a lot. Could give lessons to, to... no, name gone. Doesn't feel too bad about that one. Doesn't feel very angry, or scared, either... well, never gonna see her again. That's probably it. Still isn't gonna poke that idea much. Isn't _that_ stupid.

"Oh! Um, yeah. All these extra people I wasn't expecting at all. Uh. Nice to meet you? For the first time ever." Dinosaur looks around at everyone. Doesn't look very surprised. At all. Why not? Bites their lip, tries to think. Gives up. "Well, um, this is probably gonna take a while but it won't be very exciting. I could find some, some history tapes for you to watch. S-sodas, maybe? Or, uh, tea? I found this great powdered stuff, it tastes almost real."

They don't answer. Pretty sure they're not included in the offer.

"Sure, I'll give it a try," says fish lady. Sounds different than she usually does. Like she's trying to be nice. Weird.

"I too will try this tea! Tea is filled with important nutritional goodness!"

"Yeah, like vitamin tea," says short one. Snickers. "Anyway, I'm probably not gonna hang out long, I've got a post out here I should check on while I've got the chance." Reaches into hoodie, pulls out bottle of ketchup. "I'm good on a drink, I brought my own." Turns their head and looks up at him while he raises the bottle and drinks and drinks and- oh! Bottle slips right out of his hand. Watches it flip around in the air, ketchup spray out, all over his shirt. Tall skeleton dives for it, catches the bottle.

"S̶̷̸̲̅a̶̷̸̲̅n̶̷̸̲̅s̶̷̸̲̅!" Tall skeleton shakes bottle at short. "How could you be that clumsy?"

Short skeleton looks down at ketchup mess. "Geez. Guess I'd better try and take care of this. Do you have somewhere I can wash this off?"

"Huh?" says the dinosaur. "Uh, oh, right! Yeah! The bathroom's over that way!" She waves over through the main part of the lab.

"Thanks." Skeleton wanders off. Wait... since when do monsters have bathrooms? Well, maybe that's what they _do_ call it, after all. Might make sense. Do have baths. Wait. Since when would he care about spilling ketchup? Something _weird_ going on here. But nobody else says anything, so maybe it doesn't matter?

"Well, um," says the dinosaur. "U̶̷̸̲̅n̶̷̸̲̅d̶̷̸̲̅y̶̷̸̲̅n̶̷̸̲̅e̶̷̸̲̅, uh, why don't you pick something out for the two of you to watch? I should, I need to take the human over here. They're... they're safe, right?"

Crosses their arms. Scowls. "Don't _bite_."

"R-right. Well, uh, if you'll come this way?" She starts walking, and they follow along behind her. They try and peek around, try to figure out where to go if they want to sneak out. But the dinosaur keeps talking. "So, uh, do you know why you're here?"

They uncross their arms. Sighs. Looks back, sees fish-lady looking at tapes, faced away. " _Says_ broken soul. Just doesn't wanna take it. Not without fighting. Stupid. Would help _everyone_. Don't need it. And _yes_ , know about the dying part. Doesn't matter. Did a lot of bad stuff. Not gonna make anybody sad that way."

Dinosaur lady stops short. Nearly run into her legs. They can't help but squeak up at her. "O-okay," she says. "Th-that's what that sounds like. Um. Uh. What do I, uh, let's just keep walking. There, there, uh, might be some weird stuff going on with your soul. So we're gonna take a look at it. It's not gonna hurt or anything. Um, you won't even feel anything, I don't think. Everything's wireless so, um, as long as you stay in the area I've got marked out for you, you can move around, too." There's a big messy computer desk that she stops in front of. Only one chair. She uses it and pulls up to computer. "Okay. So, I'm going to need to set things up here first, then you can sit down if you want."

Looks down at the floor. Sees some tape making a square around the desk. Some room. Not a lot. Could be worse. Rubs forehead. Could be all alone, needles everywhere, lying down. Pretty sure if they cried at least the tall skeleton would come over. Isn't like a hospital at all.

Door opens further up the room. Short skeleton walks out. Looks a little less ketchuppy, shirt sorta damp. "Hey, uh, I'm gonna go check on some stuff." he says. Walks over, settles hands on their shoulders. "You be good, okay? You'll do fine." Gives a squeeze and lets go. They lift a hand, wave at him before he turns away.

Dinosaur finally finishes typing, stands up. "Um, okay. I've got this calibrated so it's picking you up. See that right there?" Points at a lot of squiggly lines on the screen. "That's your soul! Okay, I'm, uh, gonna minimize this. If that bar down there flashes, you call me over, okay? I've got some other equipment I need to check on, so, uh, how about I find you something to watch while we take these recordings." She leans over and starts clicking some things, pulls up a folder. "Uh, how about this? It's about a girl who finds out about a weird ritual at her school and accidentally becomes engaged to-"

"No schools," they say. Frown, look down at the chair, then up at the dinosaur. "No schools."

"Um. Okay then," says the dinosaur. She goes to a different folder. "Um, how about this? There's no schools in it. It's about a wizard who goes on adventures and makes friends and the wizard keeps blowing up towns with her magic spells when she tries to help them?"

They shrug. "Sure, whatever." Let her click up the first video and they sit down. Looks kinda like an old cartoon but they're a bit surprised they've got cartoons at all here.

She makes some more adjustments, then says, "Okay, you might need to read the bottom to know what they're saying. Unless all humans know the language they're talking in! But the words are there. You can hit that button right there when the episode ends. That'll put the next one on. That, uh, that should be everything. Can I get you anything? It might be a while, a few hours maybe or you might need to spend the night. I dunno yet. I need to go check on some of the other instruments."

"Don't need anything." Look at the screen. Have to lean in and squint to read the words. And they move too fast. Can't tell any word they're saying out loud, either. Shrugs. But the wizard lady seems like she's good at blowing stuff up. Don't need to understand to watch that, they guess.

Dinosaur pats the back of the chair and scuffles backwards. "Okay then. Um, remember, just stay inside the tape. I'll be a while looking at this, and, uh, you can press that button right there if you need me for anything, and I'll come over. Do that if that window blinks. If you need a drink or something while I'm working, just call U̶̷̸̲̅n̶̷̸̲̅d̶̷̸̲̅y̶̷̸̲̅n̶̷̸̲̅e̶̷̸̲̅ , okay?" She points back to where everyone's watching their show. Can sort of hear some sort of talking they can't understand from that tv. Can't see anybody, all around the corner. They nod, and the dinosaur wanders off... into the bathroom the short skeleton came out of.

Very, very weird. They reach for the computer mouse and squint, looking for the button to push the show down off the screen. Find it, then squint at all the dinosaur's programs. Gotta be a way to get maps somehow... They find one that looks like it should bring up the Internet. Look for a search button. Finds it, then squints at keyboard. Types M-A-P. They pick the first thing that comes up. Chews lower lip, tries to think of how to find right directions. Tries searching map for 'king'.

Hurts to read screen, but they don't have to do it long. First answer looks right. Lots of directions, complicated. Should take a while. But not too long. Sees a printer they can get to without having to get out of the square, and tells the directions to print.

Look at the paper. Everything looks good. Easy to follow. They shove it into their pocket. Not the hoodie pocket. Should probably leave that behind. Should probably stay for a while. Closes the Internet, and pulls show back up. Short skeleton just left out door they need to use. Needs to wait until they're sure he'll be out of the way. Can't be stopped.

Show first.

* * *

Sans hangs out outside the door to the lab for a count of ten, then starts doing calculations in his head. Bigger adjustment for vertical displacement on this one, and he's just not familiar enough with either the starting ground or endpoint to be able to handwave the details. But it's not exactly hard math, so it's not long before he's satisfied enough to take a step, and wind up somewhere very different.

The lab's lobby is just familiar enough to be unnerving. The harsh fluorescent lights that glare down at him give the mistaken impression that it's at all safe for him to wander around on his own. But it's been years, and he only worked out of here for two weeks when they'd been cleaning up actual workspace prior to starting. Amazing what a hideous accident can do for science funding in a strained economy. A hideous accident that just makes your head hurt when you think of whatever exactly it did and _damn_ it there it goes. He rubs his forehead and sighs.

Still, shouldn't wander around down here. He makes for the vending machine and makes a contemplative noise over the years-old potato chips sitting there. That misprint on the bags... yeah, he remembers that, and the complaints, and the memos that emphasized they were _completely safe_ , the misprint just meant they'd been able to get them in bulk at a massive discount. Nobody really ate them. Sans pulls up some change from his pocket and drops it in the slot. He picks out catsup flavour. The inferior choice, relative to ketchup. He leans against a wall and waits, munching.

The elevator opens after a while and Alphys steps out. She jumps when she sees him, but recovers pretty quickly for her. "Oh my god," she says. "Oh my god, I knew you could do that, but I wasn't, you know, expecting. Um."

Sans shrugs and crumples the empty bag into his pocket. "Lotta magic goes into a person," he says, pushing off the wall. "No need for subconscious functions to hold skin in place. Let alone the rest of the internals. From there it's just learning applications. Should see some of the stuff my brother pulls."

"I'll, uh, I'll take your word for it," says Alphys. "I got the papers you left, and the USB stick. That's got the originals?"

"Yeah. Figured if my stuff isn't outputting in the wrong format we could probably help use it for pattern matching." He rubs the back of his skull. "Dunno how useful some of it will be, I don't really have the equipment to be making full dumps, especially on a human. Direct soul handling isn't my thing. But I've got solid timelines."

"It's not really _my_ -" Alphys sighs, and starts waving him down a hallway. "Well, I guess it is now. Uh, just kind of looking at this graph, you're probably onto something with the amalgamation theory. It's pretty similar, but as far as I can tell, a lot of the functions that would be handled by magic in a monster are offloaded to the soul in a human. The difference isn't _just_ determination. I mean, that's what fuels everything, but, uh, you know what I mean. Uh, be careful. None of them really come over this way and I made sure to check on everyone before I came, but yeah."

Sans follows along. "You tell any of them about what happened? Some of them've lost family 'cause of all this."

"I... no." Alphys stops, fingers running against the wall. "I probably should. It's just... well. I don't know how to tell them. Especially if it was caused by someone like them? I don't know." She pulls her hand away from the wall and starts walking again.

"Fair enough," says Sans. "Just thought it was worth asking. So what sort of handling does the human soul do?"

It's an easier subject for Alphys. "Uh, well, it interfaces with the brain in ways I can't quite follow but pretty much all the metaphysical functions, of course- um, I _think_ determination overload is what activates the meta-temporospatial functions but that might be easier for you to gauge than me. The det-null point you've got marked here is actually, uh, slightly over the theoretical natural maximum for a human to maintain, as far as I can tell. But that makes sense, right? That's your minimum required to anchor down a restore point. But anyway. Brain stuff, uh, it definitely hooks into functions like memory and identity. Among other things, but it sounds like that's kind of relevant right now."

Sans follows Alphys into a small lab, humming with working machines. He glances at a few with visible displays, but opts to leave off looking right now. "Seems to be. That binding I mentioned would be primarily overlaid there. I've got those locations we need to look into- hopefully they should have the data we need to restore the, uh, system safely. But I don't know how long we need to record before we can build a file system?"

"The longer the better," says Alphys. "I mean, the soul's technically infinite. A lot of the work is context-building and immediate analysis. Theoretically you can get everything you need in a split second, but you need time to be able to do a proper sort. With some of your data we can probably take a preliminary look right now. Anyway, uh, about the brain thing. So, I kinda noticed something about the human, and it got me thinking with some of the other stuff you told me about them."

"Yeah?" Sans wipes his fingers against his hoodie pocket and looks down at his papers as Alphys spreads them out. "What about them?"

"So, uh, it's supposed to be a pretty resilient system. I mean you forget things naturally over time so minor errors aren't a huge issue. But it does self-correct." Alphys smoothes out the papers, then plugs Sans' memory stick into a computer. She flicks a montor on and reaches for a mouse. "Okay, this one has your timeline? I think the format's good, but we'll need to detransform to find a match, then retransform to make it readable. Anyway, so, uh, the soul and brain serve as checksums against each other. If something's out with one, it'll correct against the other. It also means that if there's a _problem_ with one, then the system still works, it's just a bit more delicate until the other half can be fixed through other means. Determination will heal up a soul over time. Though there's problems with that, as we've... well, wander around and you'll see where problems with that arise. I dunno how a brain fixes itself. Sorry."

Sans watches Alphys plug the timeline into the analyzer and waits for the incoming datastream off the kid's soul to find matches to the datapoints. "So it's really non-trivial to put that kid into that state of identity erasure and low retention, is what you're saying. What about that double occupancy situation?"

"We'll need to look more at the incoming data to see about the doubled-up thing going on, but as for how easy it is, it's, uh, kind of the opposite, actually," says Alphys. "Um, you said they get lots of headaches? How well do they see? They were, uh, leaning really close to the computer to follow what was going on."

Sans looks right over at Alphys. "Wait, are you saying there's _brain damage_ involved in this, too?" Dammit. Why didn't he think of that? Well, of course he doesn't _have_ a brain so it's not exactly the first thing leaping to his mind, _but still_.

Alphys shrugs. "I mean, I can't be a hundred percent. But if that's damaged and there's errors in the soul, there's no way to self-correct. Uh, let's see, I think this looks like a decent match for the start of your timeline. Let's unravel it and see?"

They both stare up at the screen, watching the progress bar climb as it does the ridiculous math on both slices of data. Sans narrows his sockets as he looks at the results; his timeline is basically identical, but the data from the soul is still unreadable. "What the...?"

"Uh, let me see what I can do," says Alphys, ticking through view settings, trying different options. "Wait, wait, wait," she says, going into another list of options. "Double occupancy, you said, yeah? Um, let's see if we can separate these channels... oh my god."

The resultant display looks a little like the readings Sans had taken. But only a little. For one, this time the waves are perfectly in phase with each other. For another, the intact wave shrinks each wavelength. Right up until the non-linear one kick in, anyway. Only that one's fragmented and literally discontinuous, as opposed to skipping back and forth in time. Only after its presence asserts itself does the intact wave start building in strength again. "What are we looking at?" he asks. He doesn't even want to know.

"Um." Alphys opens another window, pulls up a completely different graph; Sans doesn't even get the chance to read the file name. This one's wave is a consistent sine, but at a very low amplitude, if he reads the values correctly. "Um, so. If it's at the start of your timeline, I guess it's right as the human fell? Or right after. Yeah, um. It starts going... dormant. Except this... this other soul kicks in. But it doesn't look complete to me. I mean infinities, yes, but it's a lesser infinity. And it's all, all fragmented. But that seems to be enough..."

Sans rubs his forehead. "Just to be clear, when you're talking about a human soul going dormant..."

"... fallen down. This other one I opened up is from one of the other humans. Yeah."

"And it's discontinuous here, but," Sans slides one of his hand-drawn graphs over between them. "It isn't here, other problems aside. Parasitic action... but which one's the parasite? They're both infinities. Doesn't matter right now. So you're saying the kid _died_ when they hit bottom, but about a quarter, give or take, of another human soul got embedded in theirs, and with _that_ determination increase they got right back up and started... well."

Alphys looks up and down between the screen and papers. "Uh. Uh, maybe. But where would they get another part of a soul?"

Sans shuts his sockets, trying to think. "Yeah, that's the tricky part... I mean, that's just where humans fall down from, isn't it? Maybe one just never made it past there..."

"Maybe. But you need a lot of active determination to stay even a little intact in imperfect conditions. The souls we've stored are in about as perfect condition as we can get but there's still some minor degradation in the oldest few." Alphys closes the data from the prior soul. "Uh. Wait. You said that was the queen down there, right?"

"Yeah, I think so," says Sans. "I mean, her place was more or less much identical to the king's, and there was a lot of other telltale stuff. The flowers in the patch beneath the hole are the same as the king's flowers. And so on. And everyone knows she just up and vanished way back when, after the incident."

"Yeah, uh," Alphys looks absolutely any direction but right at Sans. "I probably shouldn't tell you this. It's, uh, national security, kind of. But she took something with her. Someone, anyway. The prince's friend's body... And, um. Well, I think that might not... uh, I've got some videos that the king definitely should not see. But they're, uh, worrisome."

"Hoo boy."

"Yeah. Uh, wait, what's that-?" A number of lights start flashing at once all on a number of different machines. Alphys scuttles around to check on them, while Sans flips through the diagnostic options the software offers.

"Uh. Uh, um, we've lost connection. Why would we lose connection? How would we lose connection?" Alphys runs back to stand next to Sans. "Uh, go into that, yeah, that's the camera upstairs. Maybe there's an outage? Or, or something?"

Sans opens the camera feed and just stares at it. "Or something," he says, shoving the mouse out of his hand.

The kid's gone.


	2. Supplemental Material

Again, please find the supplemental material at this location:

archiveofourown DOT org/works/5317109/chapters/12275801

You will need to replace that DOT with an actual period, as ffnet has very aggressive filtering on links and doesn't allow embedded images. Direct links are intended to be on my profile and were supposed to be there the whole time, but have been hijacked by ffnet to redirect back here.

Just read the damn series on AO3, you'll actually get updates when they're done, not several days later.


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